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Aquaponics Food Production – A Balance between Plants and Fish

11 August 2020
Corporate Communication and Alumni Relations Center (CCARC)
Aquaponics looks at the water environment including the interaction between the plants, water and fish and is a study applied to fish farming.

Plants use nutrients found in the fish waste water and help to filter the water clean, creating a Recirculating Aquaculture System, allowing fish farming to be an environmentally friendly food production system without chemical contamination.

To harness this concept hydroponic plants are grown using organic fertilizer and the water runoff is used for the fish pond, thus reducing water loss. The fish in turn feed off the food available in the runoff water, so that they can eliminate the toxic nutrients such as ammonia and they in turn discharge waste as nitrite, an important nutrient for plant growth.

Currently Aquaponics is a promising prototype for sustainable food production and an agricultural system that depends on fish farming and mixed vegetable cultivation can be done on both a small and large scale. This system is less time intensive than traditional food production systems and requires less maintenance.

However such a system requires a large investment and requires constant electrical power to run the water pumps, so further studies are required to understand the feasibility of such a system.

Department of Zoology and Aquatic Animal, Faculty of Agriculture, Chiang Mai University has opened such a course on mixed aquaculture (Integrated Aquaculture 356472). Anyone who is interested in the Aquaponics System or would like to order fresh tilapia 100% chemical free, should contact the Academic Service and Agricultural Technology Transfer Center, Faculty of Agriculture or tel. 053-944088 during office hours.
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